A Founder’s View: The Amazing Story of the Miracle of Mid-America Theological Seminary

Michael R. Spradlin, PhD and Gray Allison, ThD

Michael R. Spradlin, PhD, President of Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary, received a BA from Ouachita Baptist University, and an MDIV and PhD from Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary. He has a versatile ministry background that includes preaching, teaching, church planting, military chaplaincy, and many international and North American mission trips. In addition to serving as the president, Dr. Spradlin is also professor of Old Testament and Hebrew, church history, practical theology, and missions and chairman of the evangelism department. He is the author of many scholarly articles and books, including The Sons of the 43rd: The Story of Delmar Dotson, Gray Allison, and the Men of the 43rd Bombardment Group in the Southwest Pacific. Dr. Spradlin served as editor of Studies in Genesis 1-11: A Creation Commentary, Beaman’s Commentary on the Gospel of John, and Personal Evangelism. His newest edited book, That One Face: The Doctrine of Christ in the First Six Centuries of Christianity, by Lawrence R. Barnard, will be available in 2023. Dr. Spradlin and his wife Lee Ann live in Memphis and have three children (David, Thomas, and Laura) and two daughters-in-law (Laurel and Madelyn).

Dr. B. Gray Allison, ThD, founding president of Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary, had an extensive lifetime of ministry. He served as a local church pastor, a seminary professor, author, and an associate director of evangelism for the Home Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention among many other ministry endeavors. While serving as the president of Mid-America he also was the chairman of the faculty and the professor of evangelism, missions, and homiletics. He was a pilot and a veteran of and United States Army Air Corps during World War II in the Pacific Theater.

The following account has been transcribed from Dr. Gray Allison’s account of the founding of Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary. As the founder of the institution he had an unusual insight into the amazing works of the Lord in bringing about and sustaining this school. The document has been lightly edited for content and clarity, but an attempt was made to keep the wording as close to the original as possible. A second document has been included giving Dr. Allison’s instructions for telling the “Miracle of Mid-America” story.

—Michael R. Spradlin

“The Miracle of Mid-America”

Dr. Gray Allison, January 27, 2002

Lord, we wouldn’t rush heedlessly into Your presence, but we come boldly because You told us to. We just come to ask that You bless this service. Lord, take the songs we’ve sung and praises, as a message to our own hearts. Would You bless this time? I’m looking at Your grace and Your goodness. If there are those here who are lost without Jesus, would you, dear sweet Father, bring deep conviction in their hearts and draw them to You. I pray in Jesus’ name. Amen. Well, I’m glad to be back with you, and I don’t have time to elaborate on that except to say, “God bless you.” I want to put two verses of Scripture in your hearts. The pastor has asked me to share with you something of the greatness of God that I’ve seen demonstrated in the last thirty years. Jeremiah 33:3, God says, “Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not.” Would you hold that in your heart and remember a part of Colossians 1: 18 which we’ve adopted as the motto of Mid-America Baptist Seminary, “that in all things he might have the preeminence.”

For a number of years, some of us were very concerned about the condition of our Southern Baptist Convention, especially the theological drift. In 1962, several of us began to pray that God would give us, as Southern Baptists, a seminary where every professor would believe all the Bible, all of the way through, without any question at all. Where every professor would have an earned doctorate capable of and qualified to teach anywhere, where every professor would be an active member— Please underscore in your mind active—an active member of a local, cooperating Southern Baptist church. Where every professor would be available for counseling with the students, open doors and open hearts for the students, and where every professor would be a soul winner, where students would be required to witness of their faith for God. Well, we prayed for nine years, really. Now we didn’t have any organization. I don’t want to mislead you. It was just a little group of us who were from time to time together, and we’d pray and talk about it.

In 1971, we felt that God was leading us to begin a school like that. Now there was a little problem. None of us had any money. We didn’t have any land or buildings or library, and those are all essential for a seminary. But we did have the conviction that God wanted a school, and I want to submit to you folks—that’s enough. Thank you. Who said “Amen”? You can stay. Thank you. I usually bring Voncille with me, and she amens me. I like to be “amened,” That’s amen territory. If God wants it, that’s enough.

So, we agreed that we would start the school. We didn’t have anywhere to start it with no land or buildings or library. At that time, Voncille and I lived in Rustin, Louisiana, a town of about 20,000 in north-central Louisiana where Louisiana Tech University is located, at that time between eight and nine thousand students, now probably twelve thousand. They had a wonderful library. They had a good religion section in the library. I knew the president. I had gone to school with the academic vice president and the natural vice president, and I knew them well. The librarian had led music in revivals for me. We felt we could work out something and use their library. We thought if we had to, we could begin in our house. Voncille and I owned about a third of a house there, if anybody can understand that language. That means a building loan on most of it. We thought if we had to, we’d start there. Now that was not a good place to begin a seminary. Here about eight or nine thousand college students who need to work, and our kids would need to work, but we just didn’t have anywhere to start.

But a man in Little Rock, Arkansas, was developing a new satellite city in Maumelle, Arkansas about thirteen miles north of Little Rock. Some of you will remember that the federal government sponsored twelve satellite cities about forty years ago, thirty-five years ago; and Maumelle was one of them, was one of the only two of them that really made it. He’s just beginning to develop it, and he said he would give us twenty acres in Maumelle if we could build on it. He said as an educational, nonprofit organization he could give it to us if we could build on it. So, our trustees went to Little Rock and looked at it, and since we didn’t have anything, it looked very good to us. Kind of rolling land, rocky with little scrub oaks on it, but it looked good. And our trustees agreed that we ought to take that.

Well, if we were going to have the Seminary there, we ought to start it in that area. So, we started looking for a place to meet. Had a wonderful Southern Baptist church, Olivet Baptist Church, was the old Gain Street Baptist Church in downtown Little Rock. That area had become very, very rough, and they had moved out, bought five acres out in west Little Rock, built a brand-new three-story brick building out there, and moved in March of 1972. Their property was for sale.

Their downtown property had an auditorium that would seat about 850 people and educational space to match. Beautiful, wonderful buildings. We thought we could use the auditorium as a chapel and the educational building for our offices and classrooms and library, maybe even some dormitory space. They had gotten down to $200,000 for that property. We felt that if somebody would offer them $100,000, they’d jump all over it. So our trustees voted to offer them $100,000 for that property. One of the trustees said, “You know we really ought to sleep on this overnight and just pray about it a little more. We are going to have young wives and young children down there, and that is a terribly rough area of Little Rock. We better pray about it another night.” So, we agreed to do that.

Now I must tell you that in all my almost fifty-three years of ministry I’ve had a bunch of people predicting I’d have a heart attack, and I probably will, and I may have after preaching to you. And if I do and die, my body dies; I can’t die, would you just praise God. He’ll call Voncille. She knows what to do.

About 4:00 the next morning, I jump straight up in bed and came back down; and Voncille thought I was having a heart attack. She jumped up. She said, “Oh, Honey, what’s the matter?” I said, “I believe God has just given me the most wonderful idea.” I waited until the decent hour of 6:00 and called the chairman of that committee in Little Rock. And I said, “Gene, you folks have that brand new building. You won’t use it during the day, during the week. We won’t need it on night and on weekends. Why don’t you’ll rent us that new building and let us begin the Seminary there.” He said, “I like it. Let me call the pastor.” He called the pastor, and he called me right back. He said, “The pastor is almost jumping up and down with excitement. He’s asked God to let us use that new building seven days a week for His glory, and he believes this is a direct answer to his prayer. He wants you to come Monday night and talk to our deacons.”

So, I drove to Little Rock and talked to the deacons and told them what we were going to do and why and how. And they voted unanimously and enthusiastically— that’s a miracle—to recommend to the church that they allow us to use their building and rent to be determined by the pastor and three deacons and me. Then they asked me to come to the business meeting on Wednesday night and explain to the church; and I did that, left so they could discuss it. And the deacons brought that unanimous recommendation. The chairman of that committee told me later, he said, “Gray, when you left, a man stood up in the back and said, ‘I want to make a substitute motion.”’ And he said, “My heart just went down in my shoes. He said, ‘I move that we not allow that seminary to use our building.’ (And he paused.) He said, ‘I move that we invite the Seminary to use our building and that the rent be extra utilities and extra janitorial service.’ And the church voted unanimously and enthusiastically to do that.” That’s another miracle. A Baptist church voted unanimously and enthusiastically for something.

Well, we moved in the first of July. I looked at that thing. They had their offices on the first floor, and they had the whole first floor lit and cool. Now I figured if they did that for summer that they’d heat it for winter. So, we put our seminary office in the church library on the first floor, had classes on the first floor, and we didn’t have any extra utilities. Amen. One of our students did the janitorial work, and that’s how we started.

`We had absolutely no money. We had four professors, a business manager, and a secretary, started with a budget of $125,000 and no money. I don’t mean some.

I mean no [money]. I wish I could tell you this whole story how God gave us an adding machine for the business office which we didn’t have, and a typewriter, and a desk and chairs. Just people calling in and giving to us. We agreed that we wouldn’t ask people for money, wouldn’t ask churches for money.

We’d do what J.B. Lawrence said, and he’s head of our home mission board, “Trust the Lord, and tell the people.” So, we’ve trusted God for thirty years and told folks what’s happening. And God has raised up churches and people, and we’ve operated in the black for thirty years. That’s an amen. We don’t ask anybody for money. Nobody believes that. The crediting association comes, and they say, “How do you get this money?” We said, “God provides it.” “Well, you don’t have a program to raise money?” “We don’t raise money; we raise friends.” Amen. See, folks, God is able. He said, “Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not.”

We didn’t have any library. I gave my books which I’ve regretted and rejoiced over for thirty years. Man, I miss them, but I’m glad I gave them. My brother Phil gave a bunch of books. Dr. Beeman gave some. We didn’t have a librarian and didn’t have a library. We just put some shelves in the Sunday school assembly room, arranged the books by subject, alphabetically by author, and let the guys use them. But you do know that God knows everything, don’t you? In 1970, our daughter Susan, our eldest daughter was at Louisiana Tech as a student there, she came to me and said, “Daddy, I’m majoring in education and minoring in English. I would kind of like to get another minor. I’d like to do a minor in library science. I don’t want to be a librarian, but I’d kind of like to do that. What do you think?” And I said, “Honey, that’s ok with me. You just do it.” So, she did and married a professional baseball player.

After a year of going to a Baptist church and hearing the Word of God preached and having family altar in their home every night like Susan was taught and reading the Bible together and talking about it and praying every night, Charlie was saved. He wasn’t sure he’d make it into the Big Leagues. He thought he probably would, but he didn’t like Sunday ball and all that after he got saved so he got out of baseball and worked at Merrill Lynch. Would you like to guess where? Little Rock, Arkansas; and we had a librarian—paid for. And Suzy set up our library right from the beginning. God does things like that. “Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not.”

We started with twenty-eight students from seven states. We agreed we wouldn’t recruit students. We said if God wants the school, He must have somebody He wants us to teach and train, and we’ll trust Him to send them. And we don’t recruit students. We don’t go out and try to talk people into coming. We ask God to send us the ones that He wants us to have. We started with twenty-eight students from seven states, budget of $125,000. I wish I could tell you how God did that, but He did it. And the second year we had eighty-six students from seventeen states, and our budget went to $163,000. And the third year we had 153 students from twenty states, and our budget went to $233,000. And God kept taking care of us. We stayed in the black. He gave us $100,000 over and above that. I’d like to tell you the whole story of that one, but I’ll tell you half of it.

A man offered us $250,000 in cash if we could match it. He gave us a deadline. And the deadline came, and we hadn’t matched it at all. God just didn’t give it to us. He said I’ll give you thirty more days. The day before we had to have that money, we had $10,000. This is a real miracle. A seminary student—you’ve been to seminary—a seminary student came into my office, and he said, “Doc, my wife and I didn’t sleep last night. We stayed awake and talked and prayed.” He said, “My grandfather gave me some bank stock that’s worth about $15,000, and we believe we ought to give it to the Seminary for the matching fund.” But he said, “We’ve got a problem. It’s in a bank vault in East Tennessee.” And I said, “Son, that’s why God made jet airplanes.” Businesspeople think God does all that for them. He did that to carry on His Word. I called Merrill Lynch and sold that stock, and we flew up there and got it and came back. After we paid the fee, it brought in $14, 758.59. And God sent the other $20-something while we were gone, and we had the matching fund that’s fifty. We ended up with $100,000.

We were about to push all of that out of our building, so being the kind soul that I am I went to the pastor and said, “Russel, I believe if this church had the Christian spirit you’d give us this five acres and this building and you all would just go somewhere else.” Well, he said, “Gray, I don’t think we have that much Christian spirit.” So, I knew who had to move. It was us.

A wonderful architecture firm in Jackson, Mississippi, drew up plans for us for a library building that we could use as a multipurpose building to start with, with classrooms and offices and a contemporary chapel and a library space to accommodate thirty thousand volumes which we didn’t have then, and later be the library building. And we let out bids on that building.

I went to the Southern Baptist Convention and ran into Dr. Adrian Rogers there. And we stopped and talked a minute, and he said, “Gray, the Seminary ought to be in Memphis.” I said, “Dr. Rogers, everybody knows where it ought to be. God put us in Little Rock. He’ll have to move us.” He said, “Well, it ought to be in Memphis across the street from Bellevue.” I thought he said in a Jewish synagogue in Hebrew school, but he really said “Jewish temple” in Hebrew school. I waved at him and on down the hall. He’s persistent. He called me several weeks later, and he said, “Doc, instant seminary, everything you need. They’ve got a temple that seats about a thousand people in cushioned opera seats and a pipe organ, and they’ve got the stained-glass windows with a vine on it.” You see, the Jews thought that the vine was Israel. We didn’t have to change the windows when we got there. You know Who the vine is, don’t you? You all awake? I said, “If God wants to move us, He can move us.” He called me again. He said, “Doc, instant seminary, everything you’ll need but a library building. And you’ve got space in there for a library if you can get one.” And I said, “If God wants to move us, He can move us.” Well, He wanted to move us. We got the bids on that building, and the lowest bid on that library building was $700,000. We had $100,000. We would have had to borrow $600,000, if we could. Anybody remember ‘74? Interest rate was prime 15–16 %. We probably couldn’t have borrowed it. If we could, we would have been paying that kind of interest and almost immediately have to turn around and build another building, borrow more money. We would have been head over heels in debt. We thought that was poor stewardship of God’s money and agreed not to do it. And we looked at old buildings, old church buildings, old school buildings, old office buildings all over Little Rock and north Little Rock and couldn’t find a thing. And I called Dr. Rogers. I said, “Is that property still for sale?” He said, “Yeah, they offered it to Bellevue for a million dollars. We’ve had a committee study it. It would take another million for us to fix it like we need it. It’s across busy Jackson Street; and if we are going to spend two million on buildings, we are going to build them on our own property. But we haven’t told them.” I said, “Don’t tell them. Let me come look at it.” And I flew over there that Thursday. He took me down there. We went into the Montgomery Street entrance, which doesn’t mean anything to you; but it’s the side door. And got in there and turned left, and I opened the door to that synagogue, that temple. And I’m not a mystic. Folks, God has never spoken to me in an audible voice; and if you tell me he spoke to you like that, I’d probably step away from you. But I’m going to tell you that when I stuck my head in that door, I knew I had come home. I cannot explain that to you, but I knew that was ours. I called our trustees. We had eight in five states, busy businessmen. Usually, it takes two or three days to set up a conference call to get them all on the telephone. I got them all that afternoon. That’s a miracle. I said, “You’ve got to come up here Saturday and see this property.” We can’t get them to a trustees’ meeting where the date’s set in concrete. They can’t all come. They could all come that Saturday. That’s another miracle. They looked in that temple and said, “My, we couldn’t build this building for a million dollars.”

Well, we started dealing with the Jewish people. That was fun. We had a good time. Dear, sweet people. They were so kind to us. They had offered it to Bellevue for a million dollars, so we offered them $800,000 for it. They bought thirty acres, by the way, in east Memphis, built a seven-million-dollar plant on it, and moved in debt free. My brother went out to their opening and said, “When you all get tired of this property, call us.” They said, “It’ll take us two and a half years. You can get the property June the fifteenth of ‘77.” This is the fall of ‘74, but they said our folk don’t even consider an offer less than a million dollars. We just kept talking, and he said, “We like what you’re doing, but we’ve been offered a million dollars cash by another group. We don’t like what they do. We don’t really want to sell it to them. We like what you’re doing.” When I told them we required our guys to study Hebrew, he liked it better.

But he said, “Our folks won’t even consider an offer of less than a million dollars.” Well, we just kept talking. And finally, he said, “Well, they probably would take a million less the realtor’s commission.” That’s $940,000. The trustees authorized this offer of a million. So, we offered them $940,000. And we said, “We’ll give you a $100,000 down, and we’ll give you $200,000 in escrow. You finance $640,000 for us in ten years with 8 %.” They said, “We can’t do that.” I thought they were talking about the interest. They said one man has pledged a million dollars on our new building. We think we ought to talk to him. I said, “I think you should too, and if you’d tell me who he is, I’ll talk to him.” And they did, and I did. That’s another story. He gave $25,000 for our library. Amen.

`Anyway, we went to him, and he said, “No, fellows, make the Baptists a counteroffer. Tell them if they’ll give us $300,000 in cash right now and give us a half million dollars in cash June 15, 1977, when we get the buildings, I’ll give $140,000 so the temple gets her $940,000 and the Baptists get their $800,000 they wanted for it.” And they said, “How about that?” We said, “How about that.” I mean, praise God, hallelujah, and everything! But we’ve still got a minor little problem. We don’t have $300,000. That morning we had $155,555.55 sack and all, everything we had. So, we said, “Would you let us give you a $150,000 and the escrow fund. Give us some time to raise the other $150,000.” They gave us six weeks. Anybody remember the fall of’74? Interest was high. Inflation and recession. Stag-flation, they called it. Man, Interest Prime was 15 to 16%, and nobody had any money. They gave us six weeks. Well, the first weekend of November…six weeks, by the way, was at 5:00 the Monday after Thanksgiving. First weekend of November, I preached in a church here in North Carolina. It was about a third the size of your church. That church had been giving us $100 a month since we had started. They’d raised it to $200. I knew the pastor, but I’d never been in the church. He asked me to come for a weekend meeting, and God blessed. We had a really glorious time that weekend, but I found out something about that church. I found out it was a very sinful church. They didn’t owe any money, had everything paid for that they needed, and had $73,000 in the bank drawing interest, and that’s a sin. They were not supposed to have money drawing interest; they were supposed to put it in kingdom work.

We’re not in a money-saving business, folks. We’re in the soul-saving business. Put it in Lottie Moon or Annie Armstrong or Mid-America Seminary, somewhere. Now they didn’t even know I found out they had that, but I went home and started praying God would help us to relieve them of part of their sin. I asked God to give us $10,000 of that money.

On Wednesday night before Thanksgiving, we had $35,000. Monday after Thanksgiving at 5:00, we had to have $150,000. We walked in the door after prayer meeting, Voncille and I; and the telephone was ringing cause it’s an hour later in

North Carolina than it is real time. This pastor said, “I’ve been trying to call you.” He was home from prayer meeting. He said, “Our church voted unanimously and enthusiastically tonight (there’s another miracle) to send $10,000 to the Seminary to help pray for that property. And one of our deacons got so excited. He brought me another $100. I just put a check in the mail to you for $10,100.” And when I got through bouncing around on the ceiling praising God, I said to Voncille, “Oh, me, of little faith. I believe if l had asked God for $20,000 of that money, He’d given it to us.” We have a great God, folks. Ask Him. Well, that’s $45,000 if you’re with me. The next morning, one of our trustees called said, “The director of this company voted to give $10,000 to the Seminary.” There’s $55,000. I flew down to Golden Meadow, Louisiana, down in the heart of the Cajun country to preach a meeting in the little First Baptist Church in Golden Meadow; and on Saturday we were meeting in a Cajun kitchen, the Ducey’s kitchen, eating red beans and rice. And my daughter Charlotte tracked me down. She said, “Daddy, Mrs. Walls sent us $50,000.” I’m not a shouter, I really am not, but man, I ran all over that Cajun kitchen staining those walls shouting. This sweet lady had been a friend to me and Voncille for many years. I mean, a dear friend. She had more dollars than Carter had little pills, loved Jesus, didn’t think her church gave enough for missions. She sent extra money for the cooperative program to the state convention. Amen! May her tribe increase, never given us any, never indicated any interest. She didn’t even write a letter, just mailed a check. It’s a good letter! But I called her, and I said, “I want to thank you for that.” And she said, “Well, Gray, I got the letter telling about the opportunity and the need, and you asked us to pray. And I did. It seemed like God said, ‘Send $50,000.’ So, I did.” And I said, “Well, Honey, two things: Number 1, I’m glad somebody was on the mailing list that had $50,000. And Number 2, that you lived so close to Him you didn’t say, ‘Lord, you meant $5,000.’” That’s $105,000. You still with me? That Monday morning, I’d like to tell you this whole story, but I can’t, but Monday morning, we got $20,000 in the mail. A dollar to a thousand dollars. Didn’t ask anybody for it.

A man from Lindale, Texas, called me. He said, “How’s your money?” I said, “Bill, we need $25,000 more.” He said, “I’ll go to the bank today and borrow $5,000 and send it to you. I’ve borrowed money for a lot less worthy causes than that.” And he did.

Well, we borrowed from each other, got about $15,000. It helped to have a bunch of brothers a long about that time. We still needed $10,000. I called a business friend, asked him to lend it to us. He said, “Gray, I can’t do it. I don’t have it. I’ll take you to the bank and see if we can get it.” Now the bank’s in Little Rock. We’re not lending money in Arkansas because they were limited by the state constitution to 10 % interest, and they’d get 15–16–17 % after that in the state. I don’t blame them. He took me to the top of a bank building which will remain unknown because I think the bank did something they wasn’t supposed to do, introduced me to the president of the bank, told him who I was, and said “He wants to borrow $10,000.” And he said, “Mr. Allison, is that a corporation?” And I said, “Yes, sir.” He said, “You ever borrowed any money?” I said, “No, sir, we’ve been operating in the black for two and a half years, don’t owe anything but current bills, everything’s current; but I’ve got to have a $10,000 cashier’s check right now.” He got some papers, sent them to me, and said “Get your papers filled out. Get your trustees to approve it. Get the secretary of your trustees to sign it. Put the seal of your corporation on it. Bring it back. I’ll get my committee together and see what we can do.” I said, “Oh, sir, I don’t have time to get the trustees to do anything. I don’t have time for you to get your committee together. I have to have $10,000 cashier’s check right now.” He went and got it and handed it to me with the papers and said, “Get them filled out as soon as you can.” We had the money in hand to pay that $25,000 back Wednesday afternoon and paid that bank back Thursday, never filled out a line on those papers. That’s a miracle, folks. Can you imagine a bank doing that? I had called that morning to our bank, and I said, “We need a cashier’s check for $150,000. And I know you won’t give me a cashier’s check for money that hasn’t cleared the bank, but we’re going to write a regular check. And if we write it, would you let it clear even if the checks haven’t cleared.” I’d asked for the right vice president. They gave me this sweet lady. She said, “Oh, Mr. Allison, I know who you are and what you’re doing. You’re buying the Jewish buildings over in Memphis to train Baptist preachers. I’m excited about that. You bring those checks down here. We’ll give you a cashier’s check for it.”

Well, I went to the bank and started there on the first floor. They all laughed at me and said it was a mistake, and they bumped me up to the head knocker. And he laughed at me which made me kind of mad. He said, “No bank could do that.” I said, “This one will.” He said, “No, it won’t.” I said, “Yes, it will.” He said, “No bank would do that. That’s like a loan of $105,000 in three or four days with no interest, and no bank would do it.” I said, “This one will.” He said, “No, it’s been a mistake.” I said, “Call the vice president.” He said, “It won’t do any good.” I said, “Sir, please call her anyway.” He said, “Her? I knew there had been some mistake. We only have one women vice president, and she is not in charge of this. She’s in charge of loans.” I said, “Call her anyway.” And he called her, and she said, “I told them they could have it. Let them have it.” See, when I called and asked for the right vice president, they gave me the wrong vice president who—praise God—was the right vice president; and that’s two miracles in two banks on one Monday.

In the meantime, we had missed the plane. And Voncille is driving our car, waiting by wondering why I didn’t come out. She had a wreck. It wasn’t her fault, but we drove a wrecked car to Memphis and at fifteen minutes till five gave that check to that lawyer for the Jewish congregation. She asked me on the way over, she said, “Honey, do you think it would be wrong to ask the Lord to give us the other half million just one day early?” And I said, “No, let’s ask him.” And we did. And lacking eight days, He gave it to us ten months early. The Jews got through with their building early. Who ever heard of anybody getting through with a building early?

That lawyer called me in middle of June, and he said, “We’re going to get through in October instead of June next year. How would you like to get in in October?” I said, “Love it.” He said, “You’ve got to have all the money or you won’t get that $140,000.” I said, “Get us in. I believe God will give it to us.”

We had $200,000. We’re talking about another $300,000. He called me a week later. He said, “You are not going to believe this. We’re going to get through earlier than that. How’d you like to get in in August when you begin school?” I said, “Better.” He said, “I don’t want to put you in a corner.” He said, “You’ve got to have that money or you’re not going to get that $140,000. I guarantee you.” I said, “You get us in. I believe God will give it us.” We had $200,000. That’s toward the end of June. We had to have it in the middle of August, the twenty third day of August. By the way, they had a builder’s strike. They were delayed two months and got in in October. But the twenty-third day of August, our trustees and staff and faculty knelt and thanked God for a half million dollars in cash in hand that we didn’t ask anybody for except our heavenly Father. See, “Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not.”

Well, we moved in there. We used part of that building for a library, but you know the Shriners that built the three-story white brick building within spitting distance of that temple. You all understand “spitting distance” in North Carolina? It’s close. They had 3.2 acres that joined our 2 acres and had that building and another one on it. And I’d never been in the shrine temple. I had no idea what was in there or what they did, but it just looked like a library building to me. So, Dr. John Floyd of our faculty and I went over and knelt over at the northeast corner of that building and asked God to give it to us for our library building. In 1983, He did right in the middle of another recession. A man came up, and we had to mortgage our property and mortgage that property and borrow the money to do that. And a man came up, and I was showing him around. And he said, “Gray, you are going to lose all of your property.” And I said, “No, we’re not. God’s in this.” He said, “We’re in a recession.”

The chairman of our trustees, a godly layman, said “Recession? Man, God owns everything all the time. How can God recede?” I love laymen like that. Well, we borrowed up to $1,524,000. God gave us $401,000 to buy them five acres out in the suburbs so we could get their building. Then we borrowed the rest of it and let them draw on it at Prime plus 1. And Prime was 21.5. Some of you may remember. And we were paying on $800,000. Couldn’t get off of that at 22.5 % interest. And a man called me. I didn’t even know to call him. He said, “Could I come by and see you?” And he came by. He said, “How much do you owe?” And I said, “Well, I hate to tell you,” but I told him. And he said, “What interest are you paying?”

I said, “I really don’t want to tell you.” He said, “How much interest are you paying?”

I said, “22.5 %—Prime plus one.” He said, “You can’t do that.” I said, “I understand that. We have to.” He said, “How would you like to borrow $800,000 for a year at no interest?” I said, “Is the pope a Catholic?” He said, “I believe he is.” I said, “As much as he’s a Catholic, we’d like to do that.” He loaned us $800,000. He came to me folks! You all listening. I didn’t go to him, didn’t know to go to him, loaned us $800,000 for a year at no interest. Two weeks before it was due, he called me. We had paid him $200,000. And he called me and said, “How’s your money?” I said, “Don’t worry about it. We’ll go to the bank and get it.” He said, “I’m not worried about it. How’s your money.” I said, “We’ve got two weeks. Don’t worry about it.” He said, “I’m not worried about it. How’s your money.” Well, I said, “We don’t have any.” He said, “How would you like to extend the loan?” He came to me. I didn’t ask him. I said, “We would love it.” He said, “How long?” I said, “Till the first of the year.” He said, “Gray, be reasonable. You’ve had it eleven and a half months, paid $200,000. You’re talking about four and a half months, paying $600,000.” I said, “I really believe God’s going to give it to us by the first of the year.” He said, “Ok.”

The seventeenth of December, Tommy Lane brought a group from Bellevue down to sing for us The Messiah in our last chapel before Christmas. I was able to announce to our seminary family that we were debt free. God had given us that $600,000. See, God is able.

Well, Bellevue moved out and left us down in midtown Memphis, and it was a rough area. And it got rougher and rougher, and we were having cars stolen off our lot right there and having our girls’ purses snatched from them and having them come into the seminary building and steal the secretaries’ purses. And I was worried about our girls who worked there and their safety. And a man called me and said, “You going to be in the office for a while?” I said, “Yeah.” He said, “I want to come by and see you.” And he came by and said, “Germantown Baptist Church has outgrown its facilities. We bought 64 acres out on Highway 72, building a humongous plant; and they’ve got a great set of buildings on seven acres in Germantown. How’d you like to have that for the Seminary?” I said, “I’d love it, but we don’t have any money. I don’t believe we could even sell this for anything here in midtown anymore.” He said, “Oh, you didn’t understand. It won’t cost the Seminary anything.” I said, “I understood you then.”

A long story short—he and his wife paid $3.5 million cash for those buildings. The auditorium seats 1,250 people. It was thirteen years old when we got it. One of the educational buildings was six and a half years old when we got it, and they paid it and gave it to us. It cost us $800,000 to move, $400,000 to fix the building like we needed. You come see them. You come see them, and you’d think an architect planned that whole thing for a seminary building. It’s the most, and see God did that. God had that church build everything just right so we’d have it. Well, you may not believe that, but I know that’s so.

We moved in in January. They weren’t through with it, but we moved in, wanted to dedicate it in March. We needed $400,000. A man called an asked me if I’d take his wife through and show her the building. And I took her through and told them our students had led almost 130,000 people to Christ while they were in school since we started. She got all excited about that and the fact that our students, our graduates at that time, were in fifty-two countries around the world, and he said we want to have a part in the move and gave me a check for $300,000. I nearly fell off the stairs. I’m talking about a little household check, handwritten, $300,000. Well, we got to time to dedicate, and we still needed $50,000. About 5:30, the day we were going to dedicate at 7:00—We wanted to dedicate debt free, needed $50,000—I started up those stairs toward my office. I love those stairs. A man rounded the comer. He said, “Wait a minute, Gray.” He said, “How much you need to dedicate debt free?” I said, “$50,000.” He said, “Would you believe that’s what God laid on mine and my wife’s heart to give.” So we dedicated them debt free. See, “Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not.”

I had the Northeast on my heart all my life. One of my sisters married a Yankee from New Hampshire in 1945, moved up there in ‘46. I’d go to see them. Folks, a drought of Bible-believing, Bible-preaching, soul-winning churches up there. Just can’t find them, and God laid that on my heart. I asked the trustees if we could start a branch there. Hopefully, it’ll grow into another seminary under the same board. The board of regents up there wouldn’t let us until we were fully accredited. We got fully accredited. I went, and they said, “You’re not financially sound.” I said, “Been operating nine and a half years in the black, don’t owe anybody anything. Our campus is paid for. All the equipment and furnishings are paid for.” They said, “You don’t have any endowment.” I said, “How many schools of higher education in New York state don’t owe any money?” Guess how many they named… zero. I said, “I believe that’s good financial basis.” Took us five and a half years to get them to let us start. Somebody said, “Why did you start there?” Because within a radius of 250 miles of Albany, New York, live 25% of the people of this country and part of Canada. Go home and draw that circle. That’s within a five-hour drive, folks. Our students could fan out and touch a quarter of the population of this country, most of them lost.

We bought ten acres of land a mile off interstate 90, and that interchange is a quarter of a mile from interstate 890. That interchange is a quarter of a mile from interstate 90, runs from New York City to Seattle, Washington. Great location, built a building there, put 15,000-plus books in there, started with three full-time professors all with earned doctorates and seven students in August of 1989. We’ve had seventy-two students so far this year up there, and we’re training pastors! There are now five Southern Baptists missions and two Bible studies that are about to become missions right now, right there in the capitol district. We’re having an impact on the whole Northeast because those professors and students win people to Christ and plant churches and grow churches. And God gave us that building debt free. We moved in it debt free. That’s a miracle.

We needed housing for the students. We’ve never had housing. They had to find their own, and—uh—we looked for housing. We couldn’t build on the seven acres we had. We need all that for the building and parking. Started looking for housing that was fairly close to the Seminary, close to good schools for the students’ children; and they’re hard to find. You’ve got to get out in the county to do that away from the city of Memphis. And close to work for the students’ wives who had to work. We couldn’t find anything, and a man called me and said, “I have a friend who is a member of Bellevue, and he didn’t know anything about the Seminary. Would you show him through it?”

And brought him over, and I told him about the soul-winning. Those students must win somebody—witness to somebody of Christ every week. They had led about 130,000 people to Christ just while they were in school since we started. He got all excited. We were almost there, going towards my office, and my friend said, “John’s the biggest land developer in Desoto County, Mississippi. Now Desoto County, Mississippi, joins Memphis; and the only way you know you’re out of Memphis in Desoto County is you see the sign that says state line road. I said, “You’re the biggest land developer in Desoto County. You must know the land developers in Shelby County.” He said, “I know them all.” I said, “Would you help us find this property,” and told him what we needed. He called me two weeks later, and he said, “Gray, there’s not anything that fits that.” But he said, “I own thirty-two acres in the city limits of Olive Branch, Desoto County, Mississippi; and if you could use that we could probably work out a way for you to pay for it.” A $1.5 million worth of property. By the way, they are “four-laneing” both approaches to that property. The businesspeople think they’re doing it for them. They’re doing it so those students can get to classes in about twenty minutes now, and it’ll be less than that when they get those four lanes finished.

You all’s “amen-ers” are rusty and need some Holy Ghost oil. Amen! We built ninety-six apartments for those students, six of them for furlough missionaries— furnished them completely. All the missionary has to do is bring his wife and kids and their clothes and move in, doesn’t cost them anything the year they’re there. And we’ve got real live missionaries associated with our kids. Boy, those wives have been so blessed. See, preachers’ wives can’t have friends on the church field, and most of these girls—one of these girls said her husband pastored eleven years before he came to Seminary. She said, “I’ve never had a close friend in eleven years.” Now she’s got some close friends there. Beautiful apartments! One-, two-, and three-bedroom apartments, and we rent them for less than half the going rate to those students. We built those ninety-six apartments. John and his wife gave us that thirty-two acres. Say amen. A million and a half dollars. We built those ninety-six apartments for $4.5 million, and God paid for it before we moved in. It rained from September to the first of April the year we built them, and they said, “We can’t get them finished by August.”

And I said, “God can. Let’s go down on our knees.” And we asked God to finish them, and we moved fifty-three students in about a week before school.

“Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not.” I wish I could tell you the whole story. Folks, our God is able.

We need housing in the Northeast. We’ve bought twenty—about eighteen acres of land for $2.2 million, waiting for it to be approved. You pray for the town council of Rotterdam, New York, that they’d approve our site plans, hopefully the second Tuesday in February, that we’ll get that. We’ve got three apartment buildings already on it with twenty-four apartments. The sellers agreed to update them, bring them right up to date before we get them. We’ve got a $1.4 million of that already, just need $800,000; and that’s no deal for God. Well, folks, God is a God of miracles. He never quit doing miracles. We get the idea, you know, He did it in the Old Testament and did a few in the New Testament, and He quit. He’s still at it! God is a God of miracles, and I told you a handful of miracles this morning that God has done, but I want to tell you the greatest miracle God has ever done or ever will do is to bring a soul out of death into life, bring a soul out of sin to the Savior, bring a soul out of Satan’s kingdom into the kingdom of His dear Son, bring a soul from death unto life. God is in the miracle-working business, and God wants to work miracles here today. You see, if you will realize that you sinned against God, and that your sin is separated you from God, and that sin will keep you separated from God forever unless it’s taken away; and you’re willing to turn away from that sin and give your heart—your life to Jesus, receive Him as the Lord of your life so that He is the owner and ruler of your life. He today, just like that, more quickly than I slap my hands together, will bring you out of darkness into life, bring you out of death into life, give you life now—real, wonderful, overflowing, abundant, joyful, powerful, victorious life. Right now. And it lasts forever. Heaven at the end of this. And I want to tell you folks, that’s a miracle; but God’s in the miracle-working business. And if you’ll give him your heart and life today, He’ll do that miracle in your life. You ought to come and let one of these godly people take the Word of God and help you to get that thing nailed down. Maybe you’re a child of God, but you’ve never had believer’s baptism. I’m amazed. I guess a lot of Baptist churches…I’m amazed how many people join a church and are saved later and never follow Christ in believer’s baptism. It’s believer’s baptism; and if you’ve never been baptized since you were saved, you need to come. Maybe you’re a child of God, and you live in this area. You don’t have a church home here. Ask God if this is the church. This is a wonderful church. I’ve been watching this church for several years, and God has worked here. Why have you all gone to sleep on this? God is at work in this place. I want to tell you things have happened here, and they’re happening here.

And this church is at a crossroads; and God, I believe, is going to do even greater things in these days just ahead if Jesus delays His coming, and you could be a part of that. This is an exciting church. You can find a place to learn and grow and serve here. They just showed you some places of service. Man, what an opportunity to become a part of a real fellowship of God’s people.

Maybe you’re a child of God, and you’ve let the dust of the world settle down on you. You just need to come let Him blow that off you. We’re going to sing our invitation hymn “Just As I Am,” and the minister can stand here. If you need to come, you just come. Do whatever God wants. Folk, listen. God wants to work miracles in your life. God wants to work miracles in this church. He’s just waiting for us to get into position. He’s does not work miracles until we trust Him to do it, and He’ll do that today. Would you trust Him? Let’s stand and sing. You come.

Our time is about gone, and I don’t want to drag out this invitation; but, folks, God is a God of miracles. Everything I’ve told you this morning is just God, just God. He’s in the miracle business. He’ll do miracles in your life. He’ll do miracles in your home. He’ll do miracles in this church. He’s in the miracle working business. Some of you need the miracle of a new birth today. Boy, that’s a great, great miracle, to be changed, to be brought into the family of God.

He’ll do that for you. Some of you ought to’put your life here for Him. Go to work in service. Some of you need believer’s baptism. Some of you need to come and say, “God, my life is in such shape You couldn’t bless me very much, and I want to get it all straightened up.”

Let’s just sing another verse. You come if God’s spoken to your heart. Folks, I want to tell you, “Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew the great and mighty things, which thou knowest not,” remembering that “in all things He might have the preeminence.” Would you give Him the preeminence in your life today, right now?

The next section of the Miracle of Mid-America comes from the archives of the Seminary. Here Dr. Allison teaches how anyone could tell the story of Mid-America in a short amount of time.

How to Tell the Story of the Seminary in Under Five Minutes B. Gray Allison

These are three questions which I ask when I go into churches, and then I answer them. It does help them to know what Mid-America Seminary is and what it is all about. It may be helpful to you.

The first question that people ask me when I go somewhere is, “ls that a Southern Baptist Seminary?” My answer is always the same.

It is as Southern Baptist as we know how to make it. The Seminary is not owned by the convention. We get no cooperative program money, but all eight of our trustees are deacons in local cooperating Southern Baptist churches. We have some requirements for our professors. We require that every professor be saved. We do not take this for granted. We also require that every professor have experience in the churches. I believe it is important that if a man is going to teach pastors that he know by experience what a pastor does. Every professor must accept plenary verbal inspiration of scripture. Now that is a four-bit theological term that means they have to believe all the bible, all the way through, without any question at all. If one of them did not believe the bible or raised a question about it, I would fire him immediately. Every professor must have an earned doctorate. This is so that these men are capable of and qualified to teach anywhere. Every professor must be available for counseling with the students. I believe the most important thing that any professor ever gives his students is not his notes, but his heart. Every professor must be an active member of a local cooperating Southern Baptist church. Every professor must be a soulwinner. We require every student at MidAmerica Baptist Theological Seminary to do two mission assignments every week as long as he is in school. One of these must be as a pastor or a staff member in a local church. The other must be outside the church walls where the people are. Presently our students are involved in seventyseven different mission activities in the Memphis area. We also require that every student witness to at least one lost person every week with the Word of God in a genuine attempt to lead that person to Christ. Our students this year have led over four thousand people to Christ. We believe that the professors must set the example for the students. We also require that every student take a course in Southern Baptist missions so they know how our two mission boards operate. We take lottie moon offering and an annie armstrong offering in our chapel every year in addition to the money we give to these offerings through our churches.

The second question which people always ask me is, “If you do not get Cooperative Program money, how is the Seminary financed?”

It is financed by churches and people who believe in what we are doing. It costs about $7,400 per year, per student, to train these young people. We charge them$ 800 per year. This means that we must find $6,600 per year in order to train them. We have approximately 350 churches who help us regularly through their budgets. We also have a number of people who contribute regularly. The regular contributions plus the students’ tuition bring in about threefourths of the money which we need each month. this means we must find about $53,000 per month in order to train these young people. We need 3,000 people to give us $15 per month, and this would take care of the deficit in our budget.

The third question which people always ask is “Why have another seminary?

Don’t Southern Baptists already own six?”

I am a peculiar Southern Baptist and think that we ought to have at least ten seminaries right now. We need one in the mountain west, one in the great lakes area, and one in the northeast. We have established a branch of Mid-America Seminary in the northeast because of the pressing need there. We feel that one is desperately needed. So, we have bought ten acres of land, we have built a lovely building, we have a fine library, and we have full-time faculty members living there so that we can reach that area for Christ. We believe that whole area can be salted down with Southern Baptist churches through the work of professors and students at the branch.

Those are the questions which people ask me. So, I try to answer them on the front end. I believe that if you will do this, you will find a great response. Put it in your own words, and just tell them about it.